


Not Much of a Pajama Party

by JustLookFrightenedAndScuttle



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen, Maybe pre-slash if you squint, Unlocked con pajama party
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-26
Updated: 2015-04-26
Packaged: 2018-03-25 21:44:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3826120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustLookFrightenedAndScuttle/pseuds/JustLookFrightenedAndScuttle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John's only just moved in with Sherlock When he has an unexpected guest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Much of a Pajama Party

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first fic I've published, written quickly and unbeta'd. Be kind.

John heard the doorbell, but he ignored it.  
It wouldn't be for him. He'd just moved into 221B Baker St. the week before, and no one knew his new address. No one ever visited him anyway; he'd lived in that beige bed-sit for three months and no one but him ever crossed the threshold.  
So when the doorbell rang, he didn't get up, instead lifting his head from the laptop screen and cocking an eyebrow at Sherlock. John hadn't yet worked out what rhyme or arson there was in Sherlock's behavior: Sometimes a ringing doorbell would have him careering down the stairs and skidding across the landing, and sometimes it didn't appear to register at all.  
Sherlock's face stayed glued to his microscope as John heard Mrs. Hudson cross the hall to open the door. He felt a small pang of guilt. Mrs. Hudson was not their housekeeper, as she never tired of reminding them, and she had a hip. Expecting company or not, he should have gotten up to answer the door himself.  
Ah, well, he thought. Too late now.  
He heard Mrs. Hudson and another female voice. Mrs. Hudson sounded entirely too chirpy to be seeing off a canvasser or some such. Maybe someone Sherlock knew?  
As the steps approached the stairs, John recognized the second voice.  
At the same moment, Sherlock's head swiveled, not towards the stairs, but towards John, as though he heart his flatmate's stomach drop into his shoes.  
"Christ, Sherlock, I'm sorry --" John started.  
"John, isn't this lovely --" Mrs. Hudson had reached the living room door.  
And from behind Mrs. Hudson, "Johnny, why didn't you tell me you'd gone all posh? I thought you were broke."  
"Harry," John said.  
Sherlock, looking like he'd just gotten confirmation of an answer he expected but wasn't sure of, turned back to his slides without saying a word.  
"Harry, what are you doing here?" John asked, eyeing the tote bag slung over her shoulder. "How did you know where I was?"  
Mrs. Hudson heard the edge to his voice, recalled that John could get rather shouty, and retreated while murmuring something about tea and not-your-housekeeper.  
"Not exactly a secret, is it Johnny? You wrote all about your mad flatmate on that blog of yours, and he has the address on his website. Anyway, I got back with Clara a couple of weeks ago, and it was going all right, but I just needed to get out for a bit, needed some air," Harry said. "I thought we could have a little pajama party," she added, hoisting the tote bag in front of her face as though the prop would make this situation normal.  
John took a deep breath, in and out. He and Harry had never seen eye-to-eye, at least since they were teenagers. She'd showed up at the hospital once after he was sent back to the UK, told him she had left Harry, and given him her phone, because, she said, she knew he'd never sort one out for himself. John had quite liked Clara, thought she was well out of the marriage if truth be told, and suspected Harry gave him the phone because seeing Clara's inscription made her feel guilty. It wasn't Clara's fault if Harry loved the bottle more than her.  
A week ago, John had been broke and broken, contemplating a life that stretched in grey emptiness before him and wondering how long he would endure it. He never once thought Harry could help.  
But the intervening days had changed things for John, changed John if truth be told. He had a warm, chaotic not-too-safe place to live; a brilliant, unpredictable, gorgeous git of a detective to follow around and take care of; and a new sense that he could make a civilian life after all. He'd even been looking at adverts for locum doctors.  
And now Harry came barging in.  
"So that's him?" Harry stage-whispered and craned her neck to peer around the corner to where Sherlock worked in the kitchen. John absently noted that he'd left the microscope and was dropping something from a pipette into a flask. At the same time, he caught the odor of alcohol on Harry's breath, although she wasn't acting obviously drunk. Yet. He looked again at the way the weight of the tote bag pulled at the handles and tried to guess how many bottled she'd wrapped in her pajamas.  
"Yes, Harry, that's Sherlock," John said in a normal tone of voice. "Sherlock Holmes, Harry Watson. Sherlock, I know we didn't discuss overnight guests, but can my sister sleep on the sofa? Just for tonight?"  
Sherlock looked from John to Harry and back again, as though trying to deduce the right answer.  
"Of course," he said. "Although this chemical reaction can get rather ... aromatic if it doesn't go just right."  
He raised an eyebrow at John, who had to duck his head away from Harry to hide a grin. Sherlock, if he wasn't very much mistaken, had just offered to get rid of his sister by making the flat uninhabitable. The thought was tempting, but John didn't want to turn Harry out, not if there was a chance she could work things out with Clara. If he set her loose on London now, there was every chance of a major bender. "I have confidence you won't let it go wrong," he said.  
Sherlock set the flask down like a dueler holstering his pistol, flashed an insincere smile at Harry, and said, "Well then, as we've no food in, you'd better get snow take-away for dinner, John. Take my card and go to that Indian place that makes the good butter chicken."  
"Are you sure?" John asked. "I went to ASDA yesterday. There has to be something left. And does this mean you're eating today?"  
"Of course I'm eating. There's no case," Sherlock said, the unsaid "idiot" at the end clearly implied. "And there was an accident in the fridge. With the fingers."  
Harry's expression grew more muddled and confused as John's grew more resigned. "All right," he said. "Then it's only right you should pay for the takeaway. Harry, fancy walking with me?"  
Harry never got a chance to answer. "Oh, no," Sherlock said. "Harry and I need to get to know each other."  
Now John was as confused as Harry, but he decided it was pointless to argue. Sherlock probably already knew all there was to know about Harry anyway. He shrugged on his jacket, tucked Sherlock's card in his pocket and headed down the stairs.  
As soon as he heard the street door close, Sherlock rounded on Harry, all pretence of cordiality dropped from his face.  
"I know these conversations usually go the other direction," he said, "but if you do anything to hurt John -- including drinking the vodka you have stashed in water bottles in your bag -- no one will ever find your body. And yes, I can do that. Now give me the bottles."  
Harry dug in the bag and pulled out two one-litre Evian bottles. They were full but unsealed, Sherlock noticed as he dumped their contents in the sink, refilled them with tap water and handed them back.  
"Lovely," he said. "Cluedo?"


End file.
